In the months leading up to the November 2016 election, Trump repeatedly referred to Obama's secretive Iran Nuclear deal as "the worst deal I've ever seen negotiated" (here's just one example). Of course, for a man who only speaks in absolutes, it's difficult to know what that meant for the fate of the deal but it didn't sound positive, nonetheless.
With the Trump administration lately focused mostly on domestic policy - even as Mueller's ongoing Russian probe continues to hang over Trump's head - US power and influence in the Middle East has found itself in retreat, a continuation of unsuccessful and/or failed policies implemented by the Obama administration, resulting in a power vacuum that has to be filled, and one country has emerged willing to take America's spot.
Days before last week's Kurdistan referendum, Iran took steps to isolate and punish the Iraqi Kurdistan region and the government in Erbil (KRG). This included closing Iranian airspace to northern Iraq's two international airports and sending Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard forces to conduct drills along the northwest border with Kurdistan, but in the early hours of Monday Iran dramatically escalated its military build-up along the border by deploying dozens of tanks supported by artillery - this according to a Kurdish government official and Iranian state television.
Submitted by Kamal Alam, military analyst and Fellow for Syrian Affairs at The Institute for Statecraft, and updated exclusively for Zero Hedge
On Saturday, when a defiant Iran allegedly confirmed the existence a brand new ballistic missile it has unveiled just hours earlier at a military parade in Tehran, we reported that Iranian state television released video footage Friday claiming to show the launch of a new type of medium-range ballistic missile.